Arguing About Political Philosophy

Part 1 - Foundational Concepts a. Political Authority Social Contract Theory and its Critics Thomas Hobbes - Excerpts from Leviathan Robert Axelrod - Excerpts from The Evolution of Cooperation John Locke - Excerpts from Second Treatise of Civil Government David Hume - "Of the Original Contract" Murray Rothbard - "Society without a State," The Libertarian Forum Virginia Held - "Non-contractual Society: A Feminist View," Canadian Journal of Philosophy Charles Mills - Excerpts from The Racial Contract Obedience to Authority Plato - Crito Stanley Milgram - "The Perils of Obedience" Martin Luther King - "Letter from a Birmingham Jail" M.B.E. Smith - "Is There a Prima Facie Duty to Obey the Law?" b. Rights UN - "Universal Declaration of Human Rights" James Nickel, "Making Sense of Human Rights," Robert Nozick - "Libertarian Rights" c. Justice David Hume - "Justice as Convention" John Stuart Mill - "Justice and Utility," excerpts from Utilitarianism, John Rawls - "A Theory of Justice," excerpts from Theory of Justice d. Political Liberlism Michael Sandel - "The Procedural Republic and the Unencumbered Self" John Rawls, "Justice as Fairness: Political Not Metaphysical," Gerald Gaus, "The Moral Foundations of Liberal Neutrality" Part 2 - Government, The Economy, and Morality a. Political Economy Karl Marx and Frederick Engels - "Communist Manifesto" Karl Marx and Frederick Engels - "Critique of the Gotha Program" Adam Smith, excerpts from The Wealth of Nations Charles Wolf - "Market Failure," excerpt from Markets or Governments Randy Simmons - "Pathological Politics: The Anatomy of Government Failure" b. Property Rights John Locke - Excerpts from Second Treatise of Civil Government Henry George - "The Injustice of Private Property in Land," David Schmidtz - "The Institution of Property" c. Distributive Justice Robert Nozick - "The Entitlement Theory of Justice" Friedrich Hayek - "The Atavism of Social Justice"

Matt Zwolinski is Associate Professor of Philosophy at the University of San Diego, co-director of USD's Institute for Law and Philosophy, and the founder of and frequent contributor to the popular Bleeding Heart Libertarians blog. He is the author of numerous articles in political philosophy on topics such as exploitation, price gouging, and sweatshop labor.